A computer network is formed by coupling computers to a communication medium. The computers may be coupled to the communication medium in many well-known ways, which are typically referred to as "network architectures." The communications medium may be referred to in terms of the amount of data that it can transfer in a given period of time. For example, a network communications medium may be capable of transferring ten megabytes of digital data per second.
The size of a network is to some extent limited by the size and capacity of the communications medium. For example, a high-speed bus may be limited to a length of several hundred meters, while long distance telephone lines may be used to transmit data at lower speeds over transcontinental distances. A local area network (LAN) usually refers to a network that includes a high-speed communications medium with a relatively short length, and a wide-area network (WAN) usually refers to two or more LANs that are coupled to each other through "gateways" that are coupled to lower speed data lines.
Computers coupled to the network may be referred to as client computers and server computers. A client computer, typically referred to simply as a client, may be a personal computer (PC), a "laptop" computer, a workstation, a terminal, or any other type of computational resource. A client may be used exclusively by a single user or group of users.
A server computer, typically referred to simply as a server, may also be a PC, but in larger networks is often a specially designed piece of equipment that includes a microprocessor. Servers are typically designed for use by multiple clients over the network. For example, servers may be used to provide printing services to one or more clients on the network. The services provided by such servers, known as print servers, may include queuing data files that have been sent for printing, supplying the files to a printer or printers connected to the server, routing data files to other printers or servers if the intended printer becomes unavailable, and other print services.
In addition to print servers, there may also be file servers that store files that are transmitted over the network, mail servers that provide electronic mail services to users of the network, and other servers providing other services. In general, servers are used to perform shared specialized services and to increase the accessibility of data and peripherals on the network.
In a business or work environment, users of a network are often assigned to groups for purposes of network administration. Under existing network architectures, network group assignments are typically maintained on a network security database by a network administrator, and are used to control access to network resources. A user's network group assignments are typically based on work group alliances within the business.
A network group will not necessarily include all of the users involved in a particular business unit or division, or a group may include more than one business unit. For example, if a work project includes members from several business units, then a network group may include all of these members. Those working on the project, particularly at a management or supervisory level, may wish to gather network information about the project members who are also in their business unit, such as the total disk space used by each of the members.
However, the degree of access which a user has to network information is generally determined by the user's status in relation to administration of the network itself, rather than the user's status within a particular work project or business unit. Therefore, a project manager may only have user-level access to network information, and may not be able to collect detailed network information about other project participants. Even with greater access to network information, the information could only be gathered by making a series of file server inquiries to a plurality of file servers. This is a highly inefficient manner in which to gather information.